The project company for the construction of a major highway running from Romania to Turkey and Greece via Bulgaria (aka the Ruse-Svilengrad Road) is to become operational in October.
The project will be implemented through a public-private partnership scheme.
The latest news surrounding the Ruse-Svilengrad high-speed road project were announced Tuesday after the second working meeting of representatives of the participating countries (Bulgaria, Turkey and Qatar).
According to reports...

Bulgaria's state budget has come to a positive balance for the first five months of 2012, after May became the second month in a row to register monthly budget surplus, the Bulgarian Finance Ministry announced Tuesday.
According to preliminary data, Bulgaria had a positive monthly budget balance in May 2012 amounting to BGN 284.4 M.
Thus, Bulgaria's budget balance for January-May 2012 has already reached a surplus of BGN 67.4 M, after a monthly surplus of BGN 473.8 M in April 2012.
The...

Ivan Kostov, leader of the Democrats for Strong Bulgaria (DSB) party, has argued that a successful concession procedure conducted by the authorities could attract an investor that could bring about a five-fold increase in cargo turnover at the Varna port.
The rightist leader reported Monday the results of the visit of the DSB delegation to China.
"One of the greatest weaknesses of Bulgarian politics in the past few years has been the inability to attract strategic investors that could...

Bulgarian Transport Minister Ivaylo Moskovski has cited preliminary estimations indicating that a total of 10 infrastructure sites granted under concession are expected to bring investments amounting to BGN 1 B into the country.
Speaking Monday at a forum on attracting foreign investments in transport, logistics and machine building, he explained that the two airports in the Black Sea cities of Varna and Burgas were on the list of sites granted under concession.
Bulgaria's Minister of...

First Investment Bank, FIB, has been able to find a private investor for Bulgaria's troubled largest producer of non-ferrous metals, the Lead and Zinc Complex (LZC; OTZK) in the southern city of Kardzhali.
The company is not the Polish consortium Silesia, but the name will be disclosed in 2 weeks.
It was announced on Sunday that FIB is deferring payments on loans of workers from the complex.
The decision came one day after the trade unions accused FIB of condemning the plant by placing...

Bulgaria starts on June 25 a series of investor meetings across Europe ahead of the eurobond issue that the country plans to float this year, one of the banks organizing the meetings said.
Bulgaria's parliament ratified at the beginning of June contracts with BNP Paribas, HSBC and Raiffeisen as mediators for the eurobond issue. The three banks will organize the meetings with investors.
Bulgaria plans to tap international markets to raise funds to repay the first tranche of about EUR 835 M...

Bulgaria's government is expected to list its 33% minority stake in E.ON and CEZ power distributors at the end of summer or the beginning of the autumn in a bid to enliven the local stock exchange and boost revenues.
This was announced by Ivan Takev, Chief Executive of the Bulgarian Stock Exchange in an interview for Dow Jones Newswires. Takev spoke on the sidelines of the Federation of European Securities Exchanges conference in Istanbul.
The local units of Germany's E.ON and Czech CEZ...

Power plants with a total installed capacity of up to 10 MW will not need a license for electricity and heat production, according to amendments to Bulgaria's Energy Act passed at second reading by Parliament.
The limit has been increased from the previous capacity of up to 5 MW of total installed capacity.
Besides, the amendments also say that the State Commission for Energy and Water Regulation (DKEVR) regulates the methodology for determining access and transmission tariffs via gas...

Bulgaria hopes to find an investor for its only stock exchange by the end of this year after failing to do so by the beginning of the summer as initially planned.
"In terms of timeline, the plan is to sell by the end of the year. Everything looks on track," BSE Chief Executive Ivan Takev told Dow Jones Newswires on the sidelines of the Federation of European Securities Exchanges conference in Istanbul.
For sale is the government's stakes of just above 50% in the Bulgarian bourse and in...

Greek telecommunication group Hellenic Telecommunications Organization, known as OTE, is selling its unit in Bulgaria.
The revenues from the sale of Globul, Bulgaria's second-biggest mobile operator, are to help OTE pay its obligations on bonds maturing in the next two years, according to the OTE's press office, as cited by Capital Daily.
Globul's senior management and officials have already been informed about the decision taken several days ago by the Greek company's board of...

Bulgaria will see a 10% growth in the number of tourists visiting it this summer, according to Delyan Dobrev, Minister of Economy, Energy and Tourism.
Dobrev is convinced that the growth will exceed the 5-7% initially expected.
Commenting on the amendments to the Bulgarian tourism legislation that would affect the classification system for hotels and restaurants, the Minister told bTV that hotel and restaurant owners can now apply online for changing their star ratings.
It was recently...

MPs from the Parliamentary Agriculture Committee backed Thursday the veto imposed by Bulgarian President Rosen Plevneliev on a set of controversial amendments to the Forestry Act.
The Committee will propose a support of the veto to Parliament, meaning that the procedure for drafting the legal changes goes back to square one.
Members of the Agriculture Committee agreed that the veto provided an opportunity to vote the amendments amid a public debate including representatives of...

Polish consortium Silesia is the most serious bidder for the indebted Lead and Zinc Complex (LZC; OTZK) in Bulgaria's Kardzhali, Bulgarian Economy Minister Delyan Dobrev told reporters.
"At present, Silesia is the company with the most serious intentions towards OTZK in Kardzhali," Dobrev said Thursday, amidst renewed streets protests of the factory's workers, who demand payment of their delayed salaries and a clear future for the company.
The Economy Minister explained that Silesia wants...

Bulgaria will launch the construction of its cross-border gas link with Romania in August, the country's Economy and Energy Minister, Delyan Dobrev, has revealed.
The gas interconnector, which will cross the river Danube at Ruse/Giurgiu, is being developed jointly by Bulgartransgaz and its Romanian counterpart Transgaz.
Experts have argued that the 25-km gas interconnector will be the least significant in terms of energy diversification among Bulgaria's planned gas links, dnevnik.bg...

Three energy giants have submitted bids for exploration and exploitation of natural gas in the so-called "Khan Asparuh" block in Bulgarian Black Sea waters.
According to Bulgaria's Economy and Energy Minister, Delyan Dobrev, the three are the US Exxon Mobil, the French Total, and the Canadian Melrose.
Dobrev spoke Thursday at the conference "Exploration and Production of Oil and Gas –the New Technology Frontier."
The successful bidder will be announced by the end of July, he explained,...

Bulgarian Economy and Energy Minister Delyan Dobrev has ruled out the possibility of Bulgaria exiting the South Stream gas pipeline project.
"Currently, there is no danger of Bulgaria not participating in South Stream," Dobrev told reporters on Thursday.
"We support the South Stream project. We believe it is profitable for Bulgaria, but we have to specify all the details," he added.
The Economy and Energy Minister explained that the Bulgarian part of the project will be financed by...

Bulgaria's Cabinet will allocate BGN 5 M (EUR 2.5 M) for international advertising of Bulgarian tourism in the rest of 2012, according to the government's Wednesday meeting's agenda.
According to the government press service, the funding will be used to Bulgaria's participation in over 35 international tourism expos, working meetings, seminars, and journalistic trips.
Up until 2009, Bulgaria's tourism sector was managed by the State Tourism Agency, whose annual budget was about BGN 5 M....

Swiss-based Credit Mediterranee owned by Kalmyk multi-millionaire Kirsan Ilyumzhinov has acquired a 52.5% stake in Bulgarian fuel distributor Petrol Holding AD.
The company of the former President of the Republic of Kalmykia and President of the World Chess Federation bought the 47.5% stake owned by Denis Ershov and the 5% stake owned by Alexander Melnik, according to a statement of Petrol Holding's press office.
The deal was sealed on Friday.The statutory procedures for registering the...

Angel Semerdzhiev, Chair of the State Commission for Energy and Water Regulation (DKEVR), has assured that there will be no shock spikes in prices of electricity in 2013.
In a Tuesday interview for the Bulgarian Telegraph Agency (BTA), the DKEVR Chair explained that prices of renewable energy and of heating utilities' high-efficiency combined heat and power generation would drop.
Semerdzhiev noted that the currently admissible increase in natural gas tariffs was 4.88%.
He said that...

In the first quarter of 2012, the total hourly labor cost in Bulgaria rose by 6.2% compared to the first quarter of 2011.
These flash figures were released Monday by the Bulgarian National Statistics Institute, NSI.
The total hourly labor cost grew by 4.2% in the industrial sector, by 9.5% in the services one, and by 0.4% in construction.
The breakdown by economic activities shows that the highest annual growths in total labor costs were recorded in 'Other Service Activities' - 17.1%,...